Observation: Public

Observation Details

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

Yet another Hyak pit. Unlike yesterday's radio peak pit, we got the hard hardness in the right direction today. Another clear night allowed the surface hoar to grow up to 4mm. The same temp gradients was observed in the upper 20cm of the snow pack. The upper snow is still dry and somewhat bonded to the Solstice crust. A CT resulted in CT21 B @ 90 - below the new crust layer in the wet goo.

Two other key observations:
1) The Solstice rain crust is getting stronger with an upper ice layer and 10cm of pencil hard below it
2) The 12/9 crust is weakening. My guess is that the solstice water is making its way down to this layer and softening it up. While it is clearly visible, it barely registers as a change in hardness now. Also, the lowest layer seems to have lost it's moisture and is quite stiff now compared to how soft and wet it was 2 weeks ago.